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News : MTN Call Centre Workers Complain of Slashed Salaries

#contactcenterworld, @MTNGroupLusaka, Zambia, Sept 18, 2015 -- MTN workers in the call centre have complained about their slashed salaries and conditions of service as they relocate to the new owners of the call centre.

Effective October 1, 2015, Ison Zambia Linited, will take over the running of the MTN call centre. However, as per directive from government, Ison Zambia were supposed to maintain the conditions of service for the employees which they have defected.

According to letters of termination of contract circulated to their staff by reason of redundancy, all employees would be receiving a standardised total consolidated salary of K2,080 contrary to some who originally had gross salary of about K8,000.

"In view of the aforementioned, kindly be advised that your services are hereby terminated by reason of redundancy and that you are officially served with 30 days notice of termination with effect from 1 September. You are accordingly advised that you are entitled to redundancy benefits as specified in the Separation Agreement to be availed to you immediately prior to your final separation," read the letter in part.

The new conditions of service for the employees also only allow maternity leave of four weeks as opposed to the legal three months.

Employees will also not be given medical insurance and funeral assistance as opposed to their conditions at MTN.

"They are also only giving us a shift allowance of only K135 standard; before we used to receive 10 per cent of your salary. When we were spoken to at first, they said nothing would change, our conditions would not change but the contracts they have brought to us say otherwise," some employees complained.

The employees also revealed that they had failed to engage their union because three weeks before the letters were circulated, their union president, Felix Silumesi, was offered a management position at MTN.The employees complained that Ison Zambia had classified them under domestic workers when the labour commission had actually classified them as essential agents.

The employees also wondered whether Ison Zambia was not the same company with Tech Mahindra because the said company would be sharing the same building, a floor with Tech Mahindra, who took over the running of Airtel call centre.

The MTN call centre has 83 employees who have all been declared redundant.